Why do you believe in religion?

[The Snazzylands]

I'm still figuring out how to level my Faith stat.

[Greater Catarapania]

I do in fact consider it quite compelling evidence for at least one of the more dramatic miracles - at least in the sense that P(B|M) >> 0.5 >> P(B|~M), so that any prior P(M) within a couple orders of magnitude of 0.5 leaves you with a posterior P(R|M) at 0.9 or higher. Would you like to get into the details?

The Godhood claims are somewhat more complicated. In the context of second temple Judaism, the words of Christ in the synoptics regarding the destruction of the temple and the ultimate vindication of his followers would have rather blasphemous indications - that he, rather than the temple, would serve as the focal point of worship for Israel. N. T. Wright's books on the subject (particularly The New Testament and the People of God and Jesus and the Victory of God) are particularly good resources on this subject. In any case, a lot of the apologetics regarding "Christological titles" are misguided at best. The Godhood claims are there, but seeing them requires a fairly extensive familiarity with the worldview of second temple Judaism.

So, two things here:
1. I was merely making the point that most theists do not find the Bible to be a compelling line of evidence in favor of Jesus' divinity. Jews, virtually by definition, do not. Muslims think these texts are misguided. Hindus are a bit more obscure in what they believe regarding Jesus, I suspect there are thousands of variations there, but we can probably generalize their view as unfavorable. And so on. There's no reason to single out atheists as "the guys who don't take the Bible seriously," since most non-atheists also do not. That was my only point.

Fair enough. On that front, point ceded.

2. I don't know anyone who authentically believes in the divinity of Jesus Christ because of some argument involving P(R|M). No one who isn't already committed to that line of belief takes these arguments seriously.

While I can't name anyone who came to faith as a result of those specific arguments, I can think of people who became Christians as a result of rational argument in general. To take one example, my favorite philosopher, Ed Feser. Intellectual considerations also played a considerable role in the conversions of G. K. Chesterton and C. S. Lewis. I'm sure that if I did a bit more digging, I'd be able to find more examples, but that should suffice to show that, yes, people have been argued into faith, and many of them have, for that reason, taken up the craft of apologetics.

"Faith" means "Trust." Trust is earned. Most people of faith see this earned trust in their daily lives (which skeptics can all too easily reject as mere coincidence), but many of us have put the Creed to the test, both in terms of philosophical analysis and historical evidence, and found it amply supported by the light of Reason. Believing in the teeth of evidence isn't a virtue. Believing the evidence even when life gets hard, on the other hand, is. And that's what Faith is really about.

Skeptics wouldn't reject this as coincidence. They'd reject it as confirmation bias.

Confirmation bias = coincidence + interpretation.

[Gim]

I'm still figuring out how to level my Faith stat.

Pray to Jesus and try walking on water.

[Stiltball]

glad this thread - has reopened - seems interesting, even though i'm a lapsed catholic/ agnostic.

/skip/

[Firaxin]

To make peoples beloved children appear to suffer horribly for effect? Yeah, that's monstrous.

I wouldn't do that to my worst enemy.

It was eventually conceded that the belief that "suffering has a purpose" is full of holes.

I never said that I was wrong, merely that I did not have an answer for what God would do when an infant is killed to guarantee them heaven. God would ultimately make that decision, and the only I can assume is that they would probably go to Heaven. So, if you want to, go on, kill all the infants. I going to remain safe rather than sorry, meaning even if that's true I'm not going to participate. Actually God's solution may be simple, he just prevents this from happening in the first place, so even if you would normally believe that to be true, you wouldn't do it.

[The New California Republic]

It was eventually conceded that the belief that "suffering has a purpose" is full of holes.

I never said that I was wrong, merely that I did not have an answer for what God would do when an infant is killed to guarantee them heaven. God would ultimately make that decision, and the only I can assume is that they would probably go to Heaven. So, if you want to, go on, kill all the infants. I going to remain safe rather than sorry, meaning even if that's true I'm not going to participate. Actually God's solution may be simple, he just prevents this from happening in the first place, so even if you would normally believe that to be true, you wouldn't do it.

Did I say that you were wrong? I merely said that the theory is full of holes...

[Firaxin]

I never said that I was wrong, merely that I did not have an answer for what God would do when an infant is killed to guarantee them heaven. God would ultimately make that decision, and the only I can assume is that they would probably go to Heaven. So, if you want to, go on, kill all the infants. I going to remain safe rather than sorry, meaning even if that's true I'm not going to participate. Actually God's solution may be simple, he just prevents this from happening in the first place, so even if you would normally believe that to be true, you wouldn't do it.

Did I say that you were wrong? I merely said that the theory is full of holes...

And the holes are? Literally the only thing I didn't have an answer for is that question.

[The New California Republic]

Did I say that you were wrong? I merely said that the theory is full of holes...

And the holes are? Literally the only thing I didn't have an answer for is that question.

Look over the previous posts, not repeating it. Literally the holes we have discussed for the past few pages. The holes you tried to plug by introducing reincarnation into Christianity, and then distorting the idea of Purgatory to fill the same hole when reincarnation wasn't fit for the job...

[West Leas Oros]

I'm still figuring out how to level my Faith stat.

You have a faith stat? I completely missed it while grinding.

[Albrenia]

I'm still figuring out how to level my Faith stat.

You have a faith stat? I completely missed it while grinding.

I've never found the Quest to unlock it. Maybe with my next character.

[Sovaal]

I'm still figuring out how to level my Faith stat.

You have a faith stat? I completely missed it while grinding.

Eh, it’s a hidden stat essentially, and it’s usefulness varies from person to person. Some get nothing from it, some don’t even use ut, and some get awesome stat boosts from it.

[Dylar]

You have a faith stat? I completely missed it while grinding.

I've never found the Quest to unlock it. Maybe with my next character.

It depends on which version you're running. The older versions had the quest available very early-game, while the newer updates require you to grind your way to the quest.

[Dogmeat]

2. I don't know anyone who authentically believes in the divinity of Jesus Christ because of some argument involving P(R|M). No one who isn't already committed to that line of belief takes these arguments seriously.

While I can't name anyone who came to faith as a result of those specific arguments, I can think of people who became Christians as a result of rational argument in general. To take one example, my favorite philosopher, Ed Feser. Intellectual considerations also played a considerable role in the conversions of G. K. Chesterton and C. S. Lewis. I'm sure that if I did a bit more digging, I'd be able to find more examples, but that should suffice to show that, yes, people have been argued into faith, and many of them have, for that reason, taken up the craft of apologetics.

I can't speak to the other two, but I've read C. S. Lewis' Surprised by Joy, and I don't think that's an accurate synopsis of his conversion.

[Senkaku]

I don't follow any specific religion because I'm not sure if there is some divine force/God/whatever, and the variety of the world's religions and beliefs and their frequent use to political or personal ends leads me to believe if there is or was such an entity, none of them have the answers to how the world works. I'm also not convinced that even if God or gods or whatever exist that it'd be worth worshiping, since I've observed that people who don't deserve to suffer frequently have terrible things happen to them that are out of theirs and everyone else's control.

[Greater Catarapania]

While I can't name anyone who came to faith as a result of those specific arguments, I can think of people who became Christians as a result of rational argument in general. To take one example, my favorite philosopher, Ed Feser. Intellectual considerations also played a considerable role in the conversions of G. K. Chesterton and C. S. Lewis. I'm sure that if I did a bit more digging, I'd be able to find more examples, but that should suffice to show that, yes, people have been argued into faith, and many of them have, for that reason, taken up the craft of apologetics.

I can't speak to the other two, but I've read C. S. Lewis' Surprised by Joy, and I don't think that's an accurate synopsis of his conversion.

He was talked out of naturalism/materialism, at any rate. And, IIRC, he was talked out of theism generally and into Christianity specifically during a particular conversation between himself and Tolkein regarding comparative mythology. Sure, there were emotional elements in there. But there were also intellectual ones.

[Dogmeat]

I can't speak to the other two, but I've read C. S. Lewis' Surprised by Joy, and I don't think that's an accurate synopsis of his conversion.

He was talked out of naturalism/materialism, at any rate.

I don't think that's accurate either.

People make assumptions about Lewis, because he describes himself as a "reluctant" convert, and because he is considered to be an intellectual. But if you've read his accounts of his conversion, which he was kind enough to make available, you know that he carried a sense of Divine presence all throughout his life, and up until his conversion had ignored it out of fear. His conversion was not an academic exercise, it was an intensely personal, emotional one.

[Neutraligon]

Why is that the case? Why does an obstacle need to be human wide and not say distinct to the individual. Say instead of disease, it could be to learn about the universe?Or it could be to be the best at helping overcome things like poverty. Or maybe to make life easier through machines. Or to make enjoyable games or any other number of individual obstacles.

Ask that of your god. And note, I asked why there needed to be an obstacle for the entirety of the human race, not why there should not be challenge. The two are not the same thing. For instance we can learn about the world around us without having disease or natural disasters. Why can't this exist?

So basically heaven does not exist.

Humanwide obstacles are the only real obstacles,

What does this mean. If you mean the only obstacles are obstacles that happen to humans, tell that to the various species killed off long before humans existed. If you mean human obstacles as in obstacles created by humans then that makes even less sense since diseases and natural disasters exist.

we all try to solve them differently.

Correct

Why is it this way? Mostly because it doesn't matter, if there were obstacles for each individual only it wouldn't be much different.

Incorrect we have different ways of solving them because we are not perfect and do not know everything, and so do not know what will actually work to solve them. It most certainly would make a difference to the individual.

God is above us in that scenario.

This comment is useless.

We know everything observable, not literally everything, that's impossible for us.

Not true, even in a world where things like disease and natural disasters do not work, human curiosity would still exist since we would knot know everything observable. You are conflating obstacles like disease with obstacles like learning about the world around you. Why is it you assume that the lack of the one automatically leads to the lack of the other?

We are still bound by logic.

Are we? What does this even mean. Humans tend to do very illogical things due to emotion.

God can see and do infinity, it's impossible for him to grow bored or disenfranchised like us.

The second part of the statment does not follow from the first.

Humans are empathetic, while selfish.

Correct, it comes from us being a social species. God as you describe meanwhile is simply selfish.

They want others to stay happy because it makes them happy.

Yes, and? You make this seem like a bad thing.

So, if we have humanwide obstacles we'll be more inclined to take them on and relate to each other, thus also learning what it means to be good and how it leads to happiness.

The first does not necessarily follow from the second. Individual obstacles, like wanting to become a great photographer or overcoming self doubt or things like that does not prevent empathy nor does it make people more or less inclined to relate to each other. We relate more on an individual level to people then we do on a group wide level. It is why people who learned that they had cousins or friends who are gay was able to figure out that being gay did not make one a demon or something terrible.

You wouldn't learn to live life to the fullest if you couldn't die

I disagree. and once again heaven wants an answer.

you wouldn't learn to care for others when they are sick,

Given in the above scenario people would not get sick, of course you would not learn to care for others when they are sick, as being sick would not exist. That does not mean one would not care for others when other things happen.

you wouldn't learn to warn others of danger.

You are again assuming that being without the obstacle of disease or natural disaster one would be without obstacles in general, this is false. Why do you assume you would not learn to warn others of possible danger?

Without natural disasters and sickness there would also be less to learn about the world in the first place.

Not necessarily. For instnace we could attempt to learn why it was that they do not occur, despite them happening on other planets? Or we could attempt to figure out what it is about the human immune system should disease not harm humans, even if they exist. There would not be less to learn there would be an equal amount to learn. You are making way to many assumption of how a world would be without natural disasters or disease.

Heaven is not perfect.

But people live there forever. Or can people die again in heaven? The people in heaven face the exact same issue you claim makes it impossible on earth.

At least, I'm pretty sure Jesus never stated it was. I would agree with you that heaven would be hell if it was perfect. It's intended purpose is to make us happy, which could mean regular memory wipes or the loss of free will, however heaven is above logic so it could just work as intended.

So why did god not make earth above logic too. He was all powerful after all? Heaven itself is a contradiction to everything you have said.

[United Homeland]

I don't know if there is a god, I consider myself as agnostic, always doubt always question, I guess we all will know if there a god after our death

[Britannic Unity]

I'm some sort of vague agnostic if only because thinking about God and the after-life generally tends to fill me with feelings of deep dread that I'm not really willing to slog through.

I will say that I do appreciate Hinduism as a religion. I enjoy its cultural and literary wealth, timeless feeling, and fascinating philosophies.

[Greater Catarapania]

He was talked out of naturalism/materialism, at any rate.

I don't think that's accurate either.

People make assumptions about Lewis, because he describes himself as a "reluctant" convert, and because he is considered to be an intellectual. But if you've read his accounts of his conversion, which he was kind enough to make available, you know that he carried a sense of Divine presence all throughout his life, and up until his conversion had ignored it out of fear. His conversion was not an academic exercise, it was an intensely personal, emotional one.

And what, pray tell, do you think encouraged him to face that fear? Just a random whim? Or might it have had something to do with his studies and conversations with Tolkien?

Intellectual considerations played a role in his conversion. Those are the precise words I used. Do you honestly think that his philosophical inquiries and study of comparative religion had nothing to do with it?

[Gospel Power]

I don't think that's accurate either.

People make assumptions about Lewis, because he describes himself as a "reluctant" convert, and because he is considered to be an intellectual. But if you've read his accounts of his conversion, which he was kind enough to make available, you know that he carried a sense of Divine presence all throughout his life, and up until his conversion had ignored it out of fear. His conversion was not an academic exercise, it was an intensely personal, emotional one.

And what, pray tell, do you think encouraged him to face that fear? Just a random whim? Or might it have had something to do with his studies and conversations with Tolkien?

Intellectual considerations played a role in his conversion. Those are the precise words I used. Do you honestly think that his philosophical inquiries and study of comparative religion had nothing to do with it?

I like the things you are pro for

[Dogmeat]

I don't think that's accurate either.

People make assumptions about Lewis, because he describes himself as a "reluctant" convert, and because he is considered to be an intellectual. But if you've read his accounts of his conversion, which he was kind enough to make available, you know that he carried a sense of Divine presence all throughout his life, and up until his conversion had ignored it out of fear. His conversion was not an academic exercise, it was an intensely personal, emotional one.

And what, pray tell, do you think encouraged him to face that fear? Just a random whim? Or might it have had something to do with his studies and conversations with Tolkien?

Intellectual considerations played a role in his conversion. Those are the precise words I used. Do you honestly think that his philosophical inquiries and study of comparative religion had nothing to do with it?

Have you read Surprised by Joy? I don't have to guess why, he talks about it. That's why I feel confident that your view of him is mistaken.

Lewis is a man who, when he talks about Christianity, always talks about the emotional impact it has on him. Pleasure, joy, pain, fear, love. And also how it orients his view of the world. I don't think it's outrageous to suspect those of being his primary motivations.

And, if I may, I don't believe you are a Christian because you picked up an apologetic by William Lane Craig either. This is not the answer to the question "Why do you believe in religion?"

[Neutraligon]

And what, pray tell, do you think encouraged him to face that fear? Just a random whim? Or might it have had something to do with his studies and conversations with Tolkien?

Intellectual considerations played a role in his conversion. Those are the precise words I used. Do you honestly think that his philosophical inquiries and study of comparative religion had nothing to do with it?

Have you read Surprised by Joy? I don't have to guess why, he talks about it. That's why I feel confident that your view of him is mistaken.

Lewis is a man who, when he talks about Christianity, always talks about the emotional impact it has on him. Pleasure, joy, pain, fear, love. And also how it orients his view of the world. I don't think it's outrageous to suspect those of being his primary motivations.

And, if I may, I don't believe you are a Christian because you picked up an apologetic by William Lane Craig either. This is not the answer to the question "Why do you believe in religion?"

Are there non-believers who think WLC actually says anything profound or convincing?

[Greater Catarapania]

And what, pray tell, do you think encouraged him to face that fear? Just a random whim? Or might it have had something to do with his studies and conversations with Tolkien?

Intellectual considerations played a role in his conversion. Those are the precise words I used. Do you honestly think that his philosophical inquiries and study of comparative religion had nothing to do with it?

Have you read Surprised by Joy? I don't have to guess why, he talks about it. That's why I feel confident that your view of him is mistaken.

Lewis is a man who, when he talks about Christianity, always talks about the emotional impact it has on him. Pleasure, joy, pain, fear, love. And also how it orients his view of the world. I don't think it's outrageous to suspect those of being his primary motivations.

While I concede that such things played a large, and perhaps even the dominant, role in his conversion, his words on the subject in other works should not be taken lightly. Based on what he has said about the earlier stages of the transition in a number of other works, it was considerations having to do with the philosophy of mind that shook him out of his naturalism. Initially, it lead to his acceptance of Absolute Idealism, but that ultimately paved the way for theism proper. Given that he consistently resorted to arguments having to do with the human mind when arguing for God's existence throughout his career as an apologist, I feel quite confident that such arguments made a real impression on him.

When he talks about Christianity, he talks about its emotional and aesthetic impact. When he speaks of theism as opposed to other philosophical options, he swerves sharply towards the philosophy of mind. The former is, as you rightly note, quite telling. To my mind, so is the latter.

And, if I may, I don't believe you are a Christian because you picked up an apologetic by William Lane Craig either. This is not the answer to the question "Why do you believe in religion?"

It's not the reason I initially became a Christian, no, but it is the reason that I remain one. I was raised in a Christian home. Starting in my teenage years, I began to interrogate my own beliefs, and ultimately came to the conclusion that many of them - creationism, sola scriptura, the status of Roman Catholicism as a kind of apostasy - were false. The bits that lined up with the Nicene Creed formed a sharp contrast to such hollow beliefs, as they proved solid. Having tested them for years - indeed, to this day - I have yet to find them wanting.

[Tebuh]

Quite simply, it makes sense to me, I view it as the absolute truth and it fills the areas in which science has not yet explored.